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TMCnews Featured Article

February 19, 2013

Training Your Call Center Agents with Effective Scripting Techniques

By Allison Boccamazzo, Managing Content Producer

There are numerous factors that play into achieving successful call center operations, many of which feed into one another. For example, what your agents offer your customers sets the stage for customer loyalty, satisfaction and overall business continuity. If your agents sound fake, fabricated or uninterested, well then guess what, your customers will avoid you like the plague, only calling when they absolutely need to. It happens more frequently than you think or perhaps care to admit.

In order to prevent this from happening, we’re going to focus on one crucial aspect of the customer calling experience – scripting.

Scripting can serve as an easy and efficient way to keep agents on track and up to speed, but at the same time, can reverse the desired effect on customers in that scripted call center conversations can leave the customer feeling like just a number rather than name and identity. No one wants to have an impersonal conversation, regardless of the environment, and neither does your agent want to endure saying the same thing repeatedly.

Image via Shutterstock

The key here is to balance a fun, unique and original calling experience with one that is equally efficient, quick and accurate. When used right, scripting can become a powerful tool in the call center. In this case, a little goes a very long way.

1 to 1 Media recently tackled this issue head on, agreeing that a little bit of scripting can do quite a lot in the call center. The report explains, “Several organizations are still scripting their contact center conversations, either due to regulatory concerns or because they are worried agents will not say the right things to customers. While following a script ensures that an agent is passing on the exact message that the brand wants, heavily scripted conversations can put customers off by appearing too robotic and detached.”

As we mentioned, scripting usually becomes a problem as soon as it leads to a less personal experience, as also noted by 1 to 1. As Chad Forsyth, senior manager for business process outsourcing, customer operations management at Capgemini (News - Alert), a consulting technology firm, points out, scripting can quickly make the conversation feel robotic.

“A common fear that companies have when considering moving away from a scripting model is loss of control. In fact, there are instances when because of regulatory and legal concerns, companies cannot avoid scripting at least part of the conversation,” the report continues; however, when not considering the negative effects of heavily scripting, companies are inadvertently turning away from the very real customer perceptions of it.

By finding a nice balance between incorporating scripting when it’s most advantageous – such as for very basic, impersonal requests and such – as well as empowering and training your call center agents, you’ll find yourself in tiptop shape in no time.

1 to 1 offers the following tips when it comes to call center scripting:

Involve customer service experts when composing scripts

Regularly test the efficiency or success rate of scripts to make sure you alter/modify when needed

Train and empower agents to go off-script when they feel the need to

Provide different scripts to different leveled agents based on experience and expertise